The Bishop of Gloucester described the elder Thomas in 1577 as the richest recusant in his diocese, worth five hundred pounds a year in lands and goods.
When Quiney and William Parsons wrote to Greville in 1593 asking his consent in the election for bailiff, they sent the letter to Mr. William Sawnders, attendant on the worshipful Mr. Thomas Bushell at Marston.
Mr. Bushell was mentioned in 1602 in the will of Joyce Hobday, widow of a Stratford glover.
Thomas the elder married twice, had seventeen children, and died in 1615.
His daughter Elinor married Quiney's son Adrian in 1613, and his son Henry married Mary Lane of Stratford in 1609.
His son Thomas, aged fifteen when he entered Oxford in 1582, married as his first wife Margaret, sister of Sir Edward Greville.
Bridges, a son by his second wife, was christened at Pebworth in 1607, but Thomas the younger was living at Packwood two years later and sold Broad Marston manor in 1622.
A third Thomas Bushell (1594-1674), "much loved" by Bacon, called himself "The Superlative Prodigall" in The First Part of Youths Errors (1628) and became an expert on silver mines and on the art of running into debt.

Edward Greville, born about 1565, had inherited Milcote on the execution of his father Lodowick for murder in 1589.
He refused his consent to the election of Quiney as bailiff in 1592, but gave it at the request of the recorder, his cousin Sir Fulke Greville.
The corporation entertained him for dinner at Quiney's house in 1596/7, with wine and sugar sent by the bailiff, Sturley.
At Milcote on November 3, 1597, the aldermen asked him to support their petition for a new charter.
Sturley wrote to Quiney that Sir Edward "gave his allowance and liking thereof, and affied unto us his best endeavour, so that his rights be preserved", and that "Sir Edward saith we shall not be at any fault for money for prosecuting the cause, for himself will procure it and lay it down for us for the time".
Greville proposed Quiney as the fittest man "for the following of the cause and to attend him in the matter", and at his suggestion the corporation allowed Quiney two shillings a day.
"If you can firmly make the good knight sure to pleasure our Corporation", Sturley wrote, "besides that ordinary allowance for your diet you shall have 20 for recompence".

In his letter mentioning Shakespeare on January 24, 1597/8, Sturley asked Quiney especially that "theare might (be) bi Sir Ed. Grev. some meanes made to the Knightes of the Parliament for an ease and discharge of such taxes and subsedies wherewith our towne is like to be charged, and I assure u I am in great feare and doubte bi no meanes hable to paie.
Sir Ed. Gre. is gonne to Brestowe and from thence to Lond. as I heare, who verie well knoweth our estates and wil be willinge to do us ani good".
The knights for Warwickshire in this parliament, which ended its session on February 9, were Fulke Greville (the poet) and William Combe of Warwick, as Fulke Greville and Edward Greville had been in 1593.
The corporation voted on September 27, 1598, that Quiney should ride to London about the suit to Sir John Fortescue, chancellor of the Exchequer, for discharging of the tax and subsidy.
He had been in London for several weeks when he wrote to Shakespeare on October 25.
Sturley on November 4 answered a letter from Quiney written on October 25 which imported, wrote Sturley, "that our countriman Mr. Wm. Shak. would procure us monei: which I will like of as I shall heare when, wheare & howe: and I prai let not go that occasion if it mai sort to ani indifferent condicions.
Allso that if monei might be had for 30 or 40 a lease & might be procured".
Sturley quoted Quiney as having written on November 1 that if he had "more monei presente much might be done to obtaine our Charter enlargd, ij faires more, with tole of corne, bestes, and sheepe, and a matter of more valewe then all that".
Sturley thought that this matter might be "the rest of the tithes and the College houses and landes in our towne".
He suggested offering half to Sir Edward, fearing lest "he shall thinke it to good for us and procure it for himselfe, as he served us the last time".
This refers to what had happened after the Earl of Warwick died in 1590, when the town petitioned Burghley for the right to name the vicar and schoolmaster and other privileges but Greville bought the lordship for himself.
Sturley's allusion probably explains why Greville took out the patent in the names of Best and Wells, for Sir Anthony Ashley described Best as "a scrivener within Temple Bar, that deals in many matters for my L. Essex" through Sir Gelly Merrick, especially in "causes that he would not be known of".

Adrian Quiney wrote to his son Richard on October 29 and again perhaps the next day, since the bearer of the letter, the bailiff, was expected to reach London on November 1.
In his second letter the old mercer advised his son "to bye some such warys as yow may selle presentlye with profet.
Yff yow bargen with Wm. Sha. (so in the MS) or Receave money ther or brynge your money home yow maye see howe knite stockynges be sold ther ys gret byinge of them at Aysshom.
Wherefore I thynke yow maye doo good yff yow can have money".
This seems to refer, not to the loan Richard had asked for, but to a proposed bargain with Shakespeare.

Richard Quiney the younger, a schoolboy of eleven, wrote a letter in Latin asking his father to buy copybooks ("chartaceos libellos)") for him and his brother.
His mother Bess, who could not write herself, reminded her husband through Sturley to buy the apron he had promised her and "a suite of hattes for 5 boies the yongst lined & trimmed with silke" (for John, only a year old).
A letter signed "Isabell Bardall" entreated "Good Cozen" Quiney to find her stepson Adrian, son of George Bardell, a place in London with some handicraftsman.
William Parsons and William Walford, drapers, asked Quiney to see to business matters in London.
Daniel Baker deluged his "Unckle Quyne" with requests to pay money for him to drapers in Watling Street and at the Two Cats in Canning Street.
His letter of October 26 named two of the men about whom Quiney had written to Shakespeare the day before.
Baker wrote: "I tooke order with Sr. E. Grevile for the payment of Ceartaine monei beefore his going towardes London.
& synce I did write unto him to dessier him to paie 10 for mee which standeth mee greatly uppon to have paide.
& 20 more Mr. Peeter Rowswell tooke order with his master to paie for mee".
He asked Quiney to find out whether the money had been paid and, if not, to send to the lodging of Sir Edward and entreat him to pay what he owed.
Baker added: "I pray you delivre these inclosed Letters And Comend mee to Mr. Rychard Mytton whoe I know will ffreind mee for the payment of this monei".
Further letters in November mention that Sir Edward paid forty pounds.

Stratford's petition to the queen declared that two great fires had burnt two hundred houses in the town, with household goods, to the value of twelve thousand pounds.
The chancellor of the Exchequer wrote on the petition: "in myn opinion it is very resonable and conscionable for hir maiestie to graunt in relief of this towne twise afflicted and almost wasted by fire".
The queen agreed on December 17, a warrant was signed on January 27, and the Exchequer paid Quiney his expenses on February 27, 1598/9.
He listed what he had spent for "My own diet in London eighteen weeks, in which I was sick a month;
my mare at coming up 14 days;
another I bought there to bring me home 7 weeks;
and I was six days going thither and coming homewards;
all which cost me at the least 20 pounds".
He was allowed forty-four pounds in all, including fees to the masters of requests, Mr. Fanshawe of the Exchequer, the solicitor general, and other officials and their clerks.
If he borrowed money from Shakespeare or with his help, he would now have been able to repay the loan.

Since more is known about Quiney than about any other acquaintance of Shakespeare in Stratford, his career may be followed to its sudden end in 1602.
During 1598 and 1599 he made "manye Guiftes of myne owne provision bestowed uppon Cowrtiers & others for the better effectinge of our suites in hande".
He was in London "searching records for our town's causes" in 1600 with young Henry Sturley, the assistant schoolmaster.
When Sir Edward Greville enclosed the town commons on the Bancroft, Quiney and others leveled his hedges on January 21, 1600/1, and were charged with riot by Sir Edward.
He also sued them for taking toll of grain at their market.
Accompanied by "Master Greene our solicitor" (Thomas Greene of the Middle Temple, Shakespeare's "cousin"), Quiney tried to consult Sir Edward Coke, attorney general, and gave money to a clerk and a doorkeeper "that we might have access to their master for his counsel butt colde nott have him att Leasure by the reason of thees trobles" (the Essex rising on February 8).
He set down that "I gave Mr. Greene a pynte of muskadell and a roll of bread that last morning I went to have his company to Master Attorney".
After returning Stratford he drew up a defense of the town's right to toll corn and the office of collecting it, and his list of suggested witnesses included his father and Shakespeare's father.
No one, he wrote, took any corn of Greville's, for his bailiff of husbandry "swore a greate oathe thatt who soe came to put hys hande into hys sackes for anye corne shuld leave hys hande behynde hym".
Quiney was in London again in June, 1601, and in November, when he rode up, as Shakespeare must often have done, by way of Oxford, High Wycombe, and Uxbridge, and home through Aylesbury and Banbury.

After Quiney was elected bailiff in September, 1601, without Greville's approval, Greene wrote him that Coke had promised to be of counsel for Stratford and had advised "that the office of bayly may be exercised as it is taken upon you, (Sr. Edwardes his consent not beinge hadd to the swearinge of you)".
Asked by the townsmen to cease his suit, Greville had answered that "hytt shulde coste hym 500 first & sayed it must be tried ether before my Lorde Anderson in the countrey or his uncle Ffortescue in the exchequer with whom he colde more prevaile then we".
The corporation proposed Chief Justice Anderson for an arbiter, sending him a gift of sack and claret.
Lady Greville, daughter of the late Lord Chancellor Bromley and niece of Sir John Fortescue, was offered twenty pounds by the townsmen to make peace;
she "labored & thought she shuld effecte" it but her husband said that "we shuld wynne it by the sworde".
His servant Robin Whitney threatened Quiney, who had Whitney bound to "the good abaringe" to keep the peace.
A report of Sr. Edw Grevyles minaces to the Baileefe Aldermen & Burgesses of Stratforde" tells how Quiney was injured by Greville's men: "in the tyme Mr. Ryc' Quyney was bayleefe ther came some of them whoe beinge druncke fell to braweling in ther hosts howse wher thei druncke & drewe ther dagers uppon the hoste: att a faier tyme the Baileefe being late abroade to see the towne in order & comminge by in hurley burley came into the howse & commawnded the peace to be kept butt colde nott prevayle & in hys endevor to sticle the brawle had his heade grevouselye brooken by one of hys (Greville's) men whom nether hymselfe (Greville) punnished nor wolde suffer to be punnished but with a shewe to turne them awaye & enterteyned agayne".